- Laura Harrier (Spider-Man: Homecoming) plays Camille Washington in Netflix's Hollywood.
- Camille is an aspiring actress given the chance to star in a ground-breaking picture.
- Here's what you need to know about Harrier, who will appear in two movies in 2020.
In Netflix's Hollywood, Laura Harrier plays Camille Washington, a rising star. The casting couldn't be more fitting, as Harrier is also one herself—and this is breakthrough moment.
Since 2017, the 30-year-old actress was featured in a Marvel movie—she played Liz in Spider-Man: Homecoming—as well as the Oscar-nominated flick, BlacKkKlansman, and now, Ryan Murphy's Hollywood.
Camille is clearly one of the most talented actresses signed at Ace Studios. But she's also the only Black actress—which means she's not offered leading lady roles. Thanks to Hollywood's twist of revisionist history, however, Camille eventually gets her chance to shine as the star of a movie based on the story of Peg Entwistle, a struggling performer who infamously jumped off the Hollywood sign.
Harrier shines among Hollywood's star-studded cast, which includes Rob Reiner, Jim Parsons, Joe Mantello, Holland Taylor, Patti LuPone, Darren Criss, Dylan McDermott, Jeremy Pope, Samara Weaving, and more.
Here's what you need to know about Laura Harrier, the magnetic focal point of Hollywood.
Laura Harrier’s big break was in Spider-Man: Homecoming.
Chances are, the first time you saw Laura Harrier was in 2017, when she starred opposite Tom Holland in the movie Spider-Man: Homecoming.
Harrier played Liz Allen, Peter Parker's love interest du jour. Unfortunately, she and her family move to another town at the end of the movie (it's complicated!), so Harrier hasn't been in further Spider-Man films.
But Spike Lee personally sought her out for BlacKkKlansman.
After appearing in the rollicking Marvel movie, Harrier jumped to a provocative film about race relations: Spike Lee's BlacKkKlansman. In fact, Lee called her directly for the part of Patrice, interrupting her vacation on a Greek island.
"He just said he had a new project, and he wanted to meet me, and to get to New York, the next day," Harrier told Vulture. She answered the call, and BlacKkKlansman ended up being nominated for six Academy Awards.
She was also supposed to be in the HBO adaptation of Fahrenheit 451, but her part was eventually cut due to timing concerns.
Later on this year, look out for Harrier in the drama The Starling, and BIOS, a
sci-fi epic starring Tom Hanks.
She got her start on One Life to Live.
The original soap opera One Life to Live ran from 1968 to 2012. In 2013, Harrier was part of the short-lived reboot of the long-running soap.
Harrier played Destiny Evans in the series. She stepped in for Shenell Edmonds, who played Destiny in the original soap.
Taking the place of a well-known actress posed a challenge for Harrier. "It was such a weird experience, being thrown into something where everyone else has been there for, like, 50 years. I was replacing another actress, and soap fans are crazy; I would get hate mail," Harrier told Interview Magazine.
Her boyfriend is basketball player Klay Thompson.
Harrier has been with Klay Thompson, a Golden State Warriors basketball player, since 2018. The couple, who are both 30-years-old, post frequently on social media.
So, in case you needed another celeb couple to root for, here you go.
Here's another, for good measure.
Harrier had a "very Midwestern" childhood.
Harrier was born on March 28, 1990 in Evanston, Illinois, and had a happy childhood—specifically, a "very Midwestern, adorable childhood," per Interview Magazine.
At 18, she left the suburbs of Chicago to pursue her future at NYU's Gallatin School of Individualized Study, though she ended up deferring her enrollment and modeling instead. Later, she went to drama school. According to an interview with The Cut, her mom, who is a speech pathologist, and her father, who works in insurance, were "actually cool" with the whole thing.
But, Hollywood wasn't part of her original plan. "I thought I'd be doing weird, off-Broadway theater,” she told The Cut.
Her Hollywood character is based on Dorothy Dandridge.
While speaking to OprahMag.com, Harrier shared that finding inspiration for her Hollywood role was difficult. Simply put, there weren't many leading ladies of color in post, war Hollywood to turn to for comparison—but there was Dorothy Dandridge, an Oscar-nominated Black actress popular in the '50s.
“I drew a lot from Dorothy Dandridge, mainly because she the first Black woman who was able to be a leading lady and considered a movie star,” Harrier says of the Carmen Jones actress. “Yet at the same time she was this huge star, she faced a lot of adversity, and had a really difficult life. She faced so much racism, even at the height of her career.”
Harrier continues, “I wanted to pay homage to her and to all of the people who didn’t get an opportunity at the time because it wasn’t available to them.”
When she's not acting, she's at the ceramics studio.
Acting is her day job. Ceramics is her hobby. In an Instagram post, alongside fellow actress Bria Vinaite, Harrier showed off her pottery skills.
Harrier says she channels the iconic ceramics scene from Ghost when she makes pottery in her Brooklyn ceramics studio. "I like to think of the ghost of Patrick Swayze, guiding my hands," she said in a video for W.
Her Instagram is worth a follow.
If you're intrigued by Harrier, you're not alone. The actress has nearly one million Instagram followers. Follow along for her glam travel snaps and red carpet "lewks."
There are also some unrehearsed moments of joy, too.
She wants to see more on-screen diversity in Hollywood.
Harrier has been been a vocal advocate for on-screen diversity since the start of her career—much like her Hollywood character, Camille.
“I want to do romantic comedies and other films in which you don’t see people who look like me; movies where you’ve never really seen people who don’t look like Kate Hudson. I don’t know what people’s thought process was when they believed that audiences couldn’t connect to seeing people of color fall in love,” she told Marie Claire UK last August.
Fittingly, Hollywood imagines an entertainment industry that has room for all people to be stars.
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DeAnna Janes is a freelance writer and editor for a number of sites, including Harper’s BAZAAR, Tasting Table, Fast Company and Brit + Co, and is a passionate supporter of animal causes, copy savant, movie dork and reckless connoisseur of all holidays. A native Texan living in NYC since 2005, Janes has a degree in journalism from Texas A&M and got her start in media at US Weekly before moving on to O Magazine, and eventually becoming the entertainment editor of the once-loved, now-shuttered DailyCandy. She’s based on the Upper West Side.
